As Kapa’a High School continues to plan for the implementation of Smaller Learning Communities, we thought it might be nice to share some key SLC organizational practices that are linked to positive student outcomes. These findings were taken from a Review of the Research associated with Smaller Learning Communities completed by Diana Oxley at the Temple University Center for Research in Human Development and Education. We hope to embed these research-based practices into our SLC programs as we move forward.
1. The SLC enrolls no more than a few hundred students. Small learning community practice counsels schools with 200–400 students as an optimum size (Cook, 2000; Fine, 1994). Some of the most successful SLCs have as few as 100 students (Ancess, 1995). Teachers are able to get to know students’ needs and interests and to provide regular, individualized responses to students’ work.
2. The SLC encompasses at least a half-day block of students’ instructional day.
Research on half-day SLCs has shown favorable effects on students’ sense of community and academic achievement (Felner & Adan, 1988; Felner et al., 1997; McMullan, Sipe, & Wolf, 1994; Oxley, 1990, 1997b). In all cases, the half-day arrangement included courses in four core academic disciplines. It is clear from both research and practice that students register little to no sense of community from two-course blocks such as the language arts/social studies blocks frequently found in high schools (Oxley, 1990, Oxley, Croninger, & DeGroot, 2000).
3. The SLC encompasses at least 2 years of study in the SLC. Small learning communities that have attained national prominence on the basis of their students’ success encompass the entire 4 years of high school study (Cook, 2000; Meier, 1995). Common to prominent high-school reform models are SLCs that extend across at least 2 years of study (Legters, Balfanz, & McPartland,2002).
4. Interdisciplinary teams of teachers share students in common. The SLC organizes teachers—one from each major subject area—into an interdisciplinary team that shares its students in common, creating a more student-centered form of schooling than in traditionally organized schools. These interdisciplinary teams allow for coordination of student support and instruction across core subjects. Researchers find that SLCs evidence interdisciplinary collaboration and consensus (Oxley, 1997b) and instructional leadership, including program coordination (Wasley et al., 2000), to a greater extent than do traditional schools.
5. Team members instruct more than half their class load in the SLC. In the most successful learning communities, teachers instruct all (Cook, 2000; Meier, 1995) or at least most of their classes within their SLC. Teachers who divide their time between their SLC and classes outside their SLC run the risk of shortchanging their SLC’s requirements for collaboration. Successful SLCs devote regularly scheduled time to student advisement, curriculum planning, and collaboration on problems of practice in addition to individual teacher preparation. Practically speaking, it is difficult for teachers to dedicate time to an SLC when it is not their primary commitment. In addition, the more classes SLC teachers instruct outside their SLCs, the more difficult it is to schedule common planning time with SLC team members.
6. The SLC team shares planning time in common. Common planning time facilitates collaboration among interdisciplinary team members. Research frequently identifies common planning time as a feature of successful teaming and academic programs linked to positive student outcomes (Felner et al., 1997; McPartland et al., 1998; Newmann et al., 2001a, 2001b; Oxley, 1997b). This is a nearly constant item on short lists of SLC practices necessary for maintaining a focus on instructional improvements (e.g., see Northwest Regional Educational Laboratory, 2003).
7. SLCs partner with parents and community stakeholders. The SLC concept of teaching and learning rests on the view that optimal teaching occurs in a context in which teachers, students, parents, and community partners know each other and share a commitment to the school’s mission (Bryk & Driscoll, 1988; Oxley, 1994b), and teachers in successful SLCs create a broad web of such collaborative relationships. The broad base of collaboration serves to expand teachers’ knowledge of students’ learning needs and the means to increase the coherence and authenticity of students’ educational experiences.
8. The SLC has building space sufficient to create a base for collaboration. Research repeatedly finds that the physical proximity of the interdisciplinary team’s classrooms to one another is instrumental to key SLC functions. Physical proximity of teachers’ classrooms facilitates teacher collaboration (Christman et al., 1997; Wasley et al., 2000), promotes interaction among teachers and students (Ancess, 1995; Oxley, 1990), and helps to establish a separate identity and sense of community among members (Raywid, 1996). SLCs that provide a space where team teachers and their students can interact before and after class generates a feeling of belonging and a clear sense that teachers care about students, that “students learn that a school can be both educational and personal” (Ancess, 1995, p. 8).
9. Small learning community admission is driven by student and teacher choice. Research on and practice in SLCs indicate that their success largely depends on a self-chosen membership that shares a commitment to the SLC’s unique focus or mission (Allen, 2001; Ancess, 1995; Cook, 2000; Meier, 1995). Students’ ability to choose their SLC is consistent with a student-centered approach to education. Students’ exercise of choice of SLCs places a premium on informing middle-school students about high-school SLC programs. Student choice also challenges teachers to develop a set of SLC programs that responds to students’ interests and offers equal challenges and opportunities for success.
10. Small learning community offerings attract a diverse group of students.
The SLC staff members’ ability to hold high academic standards for all students and to provide students an equal opportunity to succeed is vital. Randomly assigning students to SLCs neither ensures equal standards and opportunities nor engenders the kind of student motivation and interest that curricular themes do. . Successful SLCs are organized around curricular and instructional programs that appeal to diverse groups of students (Meier, 1995; Raywid, 1996).
Other key research based practices include the following:
School and District Accommodations
· School administrators have particular assignments within each SLC.
· Counseling staff members have specific SLC assignments
· Special educators and remediation specialists have specific SLC assignments
· Academic department goals are aligned with SLC goals and needs
· Class scheduling and staffing are adjusted to enable SLC teams to establish innovative curriculum and instructional programs.
· Dropout programs and tracked courses are adjusted to increase student choice and academic challenge across all programs and SLCs.
· School improvement goals are aligned with SLC goals and needs.
· Small learning communities are represented in school governance structures.
· School and district provisions for staff planning and development accommodate SLC needs.
Curriculum & Instruction
· The SLC offers an authentic course of study.
· The SLC has a rigorous, standards-based curriculum.
· Teacher teams actively collaborate on curriculum and instruction and student progress.
· Active, authentic (student-centered) work occurs (including collaboration with community partners).
· Teams make innovative, flexible use of time and space to meet the needs of all students.
· Teachers advise and mentor students and collaborate with parents.
· Teams reflect on practice and engage in continuous improvement with stakeholders and other critical friends.
· Teams set and pursue professional development goals that accord with SLC improvement needs.
